Assassination/Combat/Subtlety PvE&PvP specs/gems/rotation [3.3.3]

Post by Enfamous

I figured we should do something like this with a title as obvious as we could make it, in attempt to reduce the number of 'what should i do' posts that i see pop up.

However, personally, i don't know much about Combat or Sub, other than the current cookie cutter specs, so if anyone with a broader knowledge on them would like to add to this, feel free. Until then, I'll research a bit more on the two and post them in the reserved areas.

++++Poisons/Weapons++++As the case is with the assassination raiding spec, slow main-hand, fast off-hand. However, in place of IP on the main-hand. Use Wound Poison VII

****Basic Rotation****

This spec is basically about controlling your opponent until you can finish them with a big Envenom. However for each class, there is a different way to open. The most basic is as follows.

First, Sap the target, so that you can move about them and prepare to open up. You may even get an early trinket, which is epic fail on their part and an almost 100% chance of you coming away from the fight as winner.

To begin, hit them with a Cheap Shot and a quick Mutilate. This should bring you to a good 5 combo points. Now. Don't immediantly hit them with Kidney Shot until the cheap shot is about 1 second or less from wearing off. You may get lucky and get an early trinket.

From there, Mutilate twice and pop Cold Blood. Finish with a solid Envenom and USUALLY its GG. However, if not. Take about proper measurements to get that last bit of health downed. (I.E another 4-5 combo point envenom.)

====Gems==== Like the raiding spec, AP&Haste are the preferred stats. Don't worry about Armor Penetration, as most of the damage you inflict comes from Envenom , which ignores armor. The same meta applys and you should yet again use the Nightmare Tear to activate it.

++++++++++++++

Post by Enfamous

Now, combat, i personally leveled with and found it to be alot better than mutilate or sub, due to the superior survivability and a decent bit of AoE. However, both the weapons and gems are different than the assassination spec. You'll be using Sinister Strike. The slower your weapon, the more damage it does, so the goal for combat is usually an axe, sword, or mace 1.8 or higher.

****Basic rotation****Open with cheap shot and work towards a quick 5 point kidney shot. (You can pop Adrenaline Rush here. If you do, however, spam SS/4CP Eviscerates until the stun wears of.) If you don't, once you get the 5 point KS off, pop Killing Spree. AFTER you've used killing spree, get a 1-2point SnD off, followed by Adrenaline Rush/Blade Furry to really give you a boost in attack speed.

====Gems====Stacking armor penetration here seems to be the most effective, as most of your damage comes from sinister strike/eviscerate. The meta gem and Nightmare Tear applys to this spec also.

Post by Enfamous

This spec is more for the rupture/back-stab/eviscerate damage. The goal is to keep rupture up as long as possible, which is made a bit easier by both the Glyph of Rupture and the Glyph of Backstab.

++++Poisons/Weapons++++For this spec, instant in main hand, deadly in off-hand would be ideal. Your highest DPS weapon should be in the main-hand, which is usually the slowest, and the lower DPS of the two should be in your off-hand. (Usually the faster.)

****Basic Rotation****In a raiding encounter, you should begin by Shadowstepping behind the boss. From there, pop your Shadow Dance and spam Ambush. After building 5 combo points, throw up rupture and spam ambush once more. Eviscerating when you reach 4-5 points. Once shadow dance is over, begin backstabbing for a good 3-4 points, and SnD. Your backstabs will increase the duration of your rupture each time you use up, up to 6 seconds. Use this time to build 4-5 points and eviscerate. Refresh SnD as needed, while keeping up your (5combo point) rupture. Slipping in eviscerates whenever you can.

Remember to shadow dance/step whenever its on cooldown. However don't waste a shadow step on anything other than a finisher.

====Gems====For this spec, I believe that stacking Agility would benefit the most. Using the above mentioned meta, as well as a nightmare tear for activation. However spreadsheets are more effective in determining what you should use. (I.E ArPen, AP))

----------------Subtlety PvP to come.

Post by Harlequin719

The information presented regarding Combat PvE is definitely accurate, but could be expanded upon. I'm in no way looking to hijack the thread, but I do feel that other things need to be added.

For starters, it's my understanding that a 20/51/0 talent spec is the most beneficial for DPS at this time. I know that I recently specced into it with Hack and Slash and I saw a definite increase in my numbers. This, of course, is debatable based on your gear, but I know that it worked for me.

The other area of some debate is that of the combat cycle. I am still running a Rupture-less cycle, and haven't had any problems with my numbers. It's possible that speccing back into Rupture will boost damage due to the fact that it can now Crit, but I have not tried it...yet. Simply put, I still use Slice and Dice and Eviscerate only.

The Combat spec is the king of cooldowns, and two of our staples aren't even mentioned here for PvE. To recover energy and pump out great burst, Killing Spree is tops, but Adrenaline Rush and Blade Flurry still need to be mentioned. Cooldowns should be used on-time, all the time, unless the fight precludes you in some way.

The trick is to combo them properly by using Killing Spree + Blade Flurry if both are available, or Adrenaline Rush + Blade Flurry if both are available.

I hope this info helps. I'm a die-hard Combat rogue (in PvP as well), so I just wanted to make sure people knew what we're capable of :)

Post by Vaelaris

Your tips for Mutilate are slightly inaccurate, misleading, or not completed. For instance:

1) Weapon selection is correct, except you would switch hands depending on the DPS of the two weapons. If Fast DPS>=Slow DPS, Fast goes in MH with DP. At least you said "generally," but you may want to point out why that may change.

2) Blood Spatter is essentially worthless. Fleet Footed is a much higher DPS gain than 30% increased damage on something you'll essentially use once. If you have ANY other class in your raid comp with a bleed, you will skip Garrote and Rupture all together. Start off with a Mutilate out of stealth.

3) Gems are correct for the majority of cases. However, there is a point where Agility gems are better than AP, although marginally so.

So please, if you are going to try and post a "comprehensive" guide to Rogues, please be comprehensive and not subjective.

Post by sinthe

Assassination End Game Raiding:****Basic Rotation****To begin, you want to obviously be behind you're target and have your raids tank Tricks'd. Open with Garrote, then Hunger For Blood. You should have at least one combo point from opening and should use it to throw up Slice and Dice. Mutilate twice, and finish with an Envenom.

If you start out TotTing the tank and have 2pc T10, you'd be wasting the energy gain. I'd open, tott the tank then proceed with the rest of the rotation. Sometimes opening with mutilate can snatch agro, but not very often if the tank is worth being called a raid's maintank. Or you could open with garotte... I doubt you could grab agro with that, unless you pull while everyone is on a smoke break.

Post by Enfamous

Your tips for Mutilate are slightly inaccurate, misleading, or not completed. For instance:

1) Weapon selection is correct, except you would switch hands depending on the DPS of the two weapons. If Fast DPS>=Slow DPS, Fast goes in MH with DP. At least you said "generally," but you may want to point out why that may change.

2) Blood Spatter is essentially worthless. Fleet Footed is a much higher DPS gain than 30% increased damage on something you'll essentially use once. If you have ANY other class in your raid comp with a bleed, you will skip Garrote and Rupture all together. Start off with a Mutilate out of stealth.

3) Gems are correct for the majority of cases. However, there is a point where Agility gems are better than AP, although marginally so.

So please, if you are going to try and post a "comprehensive" guide to Rogues, please be comprehensive and not subjective.

If you think you can do better, feel free to do so. Take the information from this (What you deem worth anyways.) and create your own up-to-date guide. I figured i could start the idea, and build onto it. That way a more experienced rogue, (such as you, almighty sir.) could take and run with it.

Also, MOVEMENT speed won't increase your DPS. Attack speed is what you may be thinking of? You won't need to run anywhere faster than your tank can S-key.

As for the advice from Harlequin, it is greatly appreciated. :D

Posts like those are the ones we need. For example, a subtlety rogue could post up the information because I'm at loss as to where to start. There are so many different ways to play one, that i can't choose which. ^^;

Post by Coldkil

Also, MOVEMENT speed won't increase your DPS. Attack speed is what you may be thinking of? You won't need to run anywhere faster than your tank can S-key.

Vaelaris is pretty correct with anything, and you fail on this point as Vae fails on the rupture point.

Flet Footed is really good since moving faster = less time to reach mobs/bosses = less dps downtime. so yes, it's a good dps improvement.

anyway, with the recent changes to rupture, i switched point from flet footed to blood spatter and i glyphed for rupture. im using it in the cycle and it's best used with 4t10 (proc is really useful managing 2 finishers and not 1). for me it's a dps upgrade, anyway i had to drop tricks glyph which is a great dps improvement for the raid.

you post is a good idea but you need to do more deep research.

Post by Vaelaris

So far I've heard a few different things to do with the 4pc T10. Either clip envenoms to keep from capping energy, talent and glyph for Vigor to allow more room for energy gain, and now use the extra combo points with Rupture. To tell you the truth, Coldkill, your idea makes the most sense to me. As long as you're not running the risk of dropping SnD and can still keep a good uptime on Envenom, I see no reason NOT to include a Rupture to burn off excess combo points.

Post by trendon

Please allow me to be the first person to ask the noob question, but I've finally got a character at level cap after five years of playing.

In short, can you please explain what you mean by "... Nightmare tear to activate it?" Thanks and I hope this isn't too stupid a question!

Post by spookypld

Muti/Prep PvP part is poor.

PvP is never such easy. While raiding You are simply doing everything in the same manner all the time, but with PvP You are against non-scripted humans, that could surprise You in every second. Fights with them won't be never the same. For example once You've Saped one, he could trinked and take You out of stealth with some ability. Good Luck then.

Basically every fight is different and it much depends on the class You are against. For example I always starts with Garrote on casters. 3 sec silence is 3 sec God mode. Then HfB>SnD>Muti>Muti>Envenom with occasionally KS, Gouge and Kick to prevent spellcasting. When You blow all interrupts You simply go behind CoS>Vanish>and start from the beginning. You can now use Prep and repeat.

This is only when everything goes fine. When it does not (and it usually does not) You must know when to trinket and choose what to do next.

Against player with pet good strategy is to kill his pet first. Sap>Blind player and fast kill the pet. Without it he will be doing less damage. Good to You, cause rogues are squashy.

Post by LeionX

Please allow me to be the first person to ask the noob question, but I've finally got a character at level cap after five years of playing.

In short, can you please explain what you mean by "... Nightmare tear to activate it?" Thanks and I hope this isn't too stupid a question!

It is a noob question but I'll save you from the flames.

Relentless Earthsiege Diamonds need one of each colour to be activated. A Nightmare Tear counts as a Prismatic and, as such, counts as one of each colour gem. (And +10 to All Stats isn't to be ignored either)

This means that as a rogue, you don't need to use Agi/Stam gems which are wasted stats, unless your stacking stam for PvP reasons.

TLDR: Using a Nightmare Tear means we only really need one gem to activate the Meta Gem.

@Enfamous: The other Rogue guide is majorily out of date. So Kudo's to you for going out of your way to make an updated one.

The only change I could make to your combat guide is that at a certain point, it might be more viable to use AP gems instead of Agi due to the Crit Capping issue or if your Crit Rating is high enough that you would benifet from the Rupture Ticks doing more damage from the AP.

Though Liquoid knows a lot more then I do. Knowing me, chances are I'm wrong.

Post by Enfamous

Muti/Prep PvP part is poor.

PvP is never such easy. While raiding You are simply doing everything in the same manner all the time, but with PvP You are against non-scripted humans, that could surprise You in every second. Fights with them won't be never the same. For example once You've Saped one, he could trinked and take You out of stealth with some ability. Good Luck then.

Basically every fight is different and it much depends on the class You are against. For example I always starts with Garrote on casters. 3 sec silence is 3 sec God mode. Then HfB>SnD>Muti>Muti>Envenom with occasionally KS, Gouge and Kick to prevent spellcasting. When You blow all interrupts You simply go behind CoS>Vanish>and start from the beginning. You can now use Prep and repeat.

This is only when everything goes fine. When it does not (and it usually does not) You must know when to trinket and choose what to do next.

Against player with pet good strategy is to kill his pet first. Sap>Blind player and fast kill the pet. Without it he will be doing less damage. Good to You, cause rogues are squashy.

True, all situations call for a different strategy, but as stated it was the most basic way to go about it. And muti/prep won't have Hunger For Blood.

As for the gem, i couldn't have explained it better myself. You can have a meta gem in the helm socket, but unless you have a gem of each color it lists, (for example, 1 red, 1 yellow, 1 blue) somewhere in the gear you've got equipped, you won't get the stats that the meta has to offer. Thus it isn't 'active.'

However, there are 'hybrid' gems that add 2 stats instead of one, these can count as either of the primary colors that it took to make it. I.E a purple gem, could be placed in a red or blue socket and count as a red or blue gem.

Post by Mariahcarrion

Sub? Anywhere?

I switched to subtlety after the patch and I was curious to see what build you proposed. I do not see one here; did I perhaps skip over it? All I see is Assasination and Combat builds.

Post by Vaelaris

As for the gem, i couldn't have explained it better myself. You can have a meta gem in the helm socket, but unless you have a gem of each color it lists, (for example, 1 red, 1 yellow, 1 blue) somewhere in the gear you've got equipped, you won't get the stats that the meta has to offer. Thus it isn't 'active.'

However, there are 'hybrid' gems that add 2 stats instead of one, these can count as either of the primary colors that it took to make it. I.E a purple gem, could be placed in a red or blue socket and count as a red or blue gem.

And using a Nightmare Tear counts as all three at once, saving you from ever having to use a 'hybrid' gem to fulfill the meta requirement.

Post by Enfamous

Added the PvE sub section, feedback appreciated. As well as any tips that should be added/removed/altered.

Post by Liquoid

Please allow me to be the first person to ask the noob question, but I've finally got a character at level cap after five years of playing.

In short, can you please explain what you mean by "... Nightmare tear to activate it?" Thanks and I hope this isn't too stupid a question!

In order for meta-gem to work, you have to have following in your gear:1 blue gem1 yellow gem1 red gem

a purple gem would count as red and blue at same timea green gem would count as yellow and blue at same timean orange gem would count as red and yellow at same time

prismatic counts as blue, red AND yellow at same time.

Post by nozzle117

Now, combat, i personally leveled with and found it to be alot better than mutilate or sub, due to the superior survivability and a decent bit of AoE. However, both the weapons and gems are different than the assassination spec. You'll be using Sinister Strike. The slower your weapon, the more damage it does, so the goal for combat is usually an axe, sword, or mace 1.8 or higher.

Combat AoE is quite superior. MH weapon speed should be ~2.6, not ~1.8. OH should be ~1.4, usually 1.5. Reason being that SS works off weapon damage, not dps...slower weapons (of same ilvl) will have higher overall damage.

Wrong spec. Should be 20/51/0. Spec into whatever weapons you've got the best of. Don't open with Garrote. Most people won't be using rupture in their rotations. Better advice would be never let SnD fall, use CD's in conjunction with trinket/enchant procs, then when they're up, don't cap energy, etc.

Gemming generalizations are always a bad idea. EP's change from gear set to gear set. Big disservice to the rogue community with this "guide."

Post by Enfamous

Combat AoE is quite superior. MH weapon speed should be ~2.6, not ~1.8. OH should be ~1.4, usually 1.5. Reason being that SS works off weapon damage, not dps...slower weapons (of same ilvl) will have higher overall damage.

Wrong spec. Should be 20/51/0. Spec into whatever weapons you've got the best of. Don't open with Garrote. Most people won't be using rupture in their rotations. Better advice would be never let SnD fall, use CD's in conjunction with trinket/enchant procs, then when they're up, don't cap energy, etc.

Gemming generalizations are always a bad idea. EP's change from gear set to gear set. Big disservice to the rogue community with this "guide."

I'm sorry you feel that way. But had i not, none of whats in here would've been stated. The most I've seen outside of the very outdated stickys, was liquoids combat PvE thread. As stated before, if you feel you could do better, please do.

Post by trendon

In order for meta-gem to work, you have to have following in your gear:1 blue gem1 yellow gem1 red gem

a purple gem would count as red and blue at same timea green gem would count as yellow and blue at same timean orange gem would count as red and yellow at same time

prismatic counts as blue, red AND yellow at same time.

Ah, fantastic. That helps a lot as I get my starter gear in order because I currently have a Meta slot open because I didn't fill the pre-requisites. If my memory serves me (and the armory is down for my char, so my memory is all I have), this would help. Thanks.

And, LeionX, thanks, too. I am trying my best to not ask the complete silly questions. I use my spreadsheet and mill along the best I can, but after signing up on Day #2, I finally (finally!) got a capped char. So, I am about the longest-running noob possible.

Post Reply

You are not logged in. Please log in to post a reply or register if you don't already have an account.